Chattanooga City Council votes on Small Business COVID-19 Relief

Chattanooga City Council votes on Small Business COVID-19 Relief

Now at 11.

Covid-19 affected small businesses in chattanooga might be able to start applying for loans this week.

My co-anchor dorothy sherman is operating remotely this week.

She explains how city council members are speeding up the process and also taking care of some technical difficulties as they social distance online.

That's tonight's top local story.

It's not you're typical city council meeting, but as members navigate virtual meetings on zoom they're taking a different approach in how they interact with the public.

Last week, things didn't go quite as well.

The zoom gathering was disrupted with racial slurs popping up in their chats.

So council members have disabled chat.

They've also added online a place where people who want to talk during the meeting's public comments time must register.

City attorney phillip noblett: "it actually provides a form so that that person will be available to be pre-recognized by the host during the meeting on here."

While council members turn digital during the coronavirus pandemic, they've been able to get some important stuff done.

On tuesday, they helped push the ball on the mayor's 2.5 million dollar small business stabilization relief fund.

The fund will provide grants and loans for locally owned small businesses.

Chattanooga economic development officer jermaine freeman: "our hope in creating a three phase program was to provide some relief and assistance to small businesses as they start to make application for some of the programs that will be offered through the federal government in form of sba lending or the paycheck protection program."

Council members unanimously approved 500,000 dollars for the fund.

City council member darrin ledford: "it's interesting to see banks here locally that are telling people that and i can speak from personal experience as a small business owner uh sorry, but you're wasting your time and this is serious and i applaud this council and this administration for reaching out and taking care of our own."

They also agreed to get back together wednesday morning to give a final vote on the appropriation.

Dorothy sherman / http: the hamilton county health department is reporting 9